Project Profile: Support Transfer of Live Bison to Tribes from Midwest Region Parks

Bison calf with its herd

NPS

Inflation Reduction Act
Restoration | FY23 - 26 $600,000

The National Park Service (NPS) will enhance conservation collaboration with Tribal partners in the Midwest through the expansion of opportunities for bison distribution, strengthening education, infrastructure improvements, and tribal-NPS stewardship activities. The NPS has transferred nearly 10,000 live bison from herds managed in parks to Tribes over the last 30 years. The transfers have been central to the establishment of conservation herds now managed by Tribes, states, and non-governmental organizations. The project helps to ensure healthy and robust populations continue to be created and maintained throughout the United States.

Why? In 2020, the Department of the Interior developed the Bison Conservation Initiative to coordinate conservation efforts and establish commitments to action for the protection of bison populations. The Initiative’s goals are ecological restoration, cultural restoration, shared stewardship with stakeholders, genetic conservation, and the conservation of wild, healthy bison herds. This project directly upholds these goals through joint tribal-NPS conservation, restoration, and collaboration efforts.

What Else? The NPS believes that ecosystem restoration and the health of our shared environment depends on strong partnerships, collaboration, and the inclusion of many experiences and perspectives. This project reflects this by working together with Tribes in the North and South Dakota. The parks involved seek to advance tribal engagement, co-stewardship, the integration of Indigenous Knowledge into their conservation and restoration goals.

About Inflation Reduction Act

The Inflation Reduction Act provides the National Park Service with an historic opportunity to address critical ecosystem resilience, restoration, and environmental planning needs. Projects funded in national parks represent broad-scale and impactful resource investments across every corner of our nation—from Alaska to Florida to Maine.